1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an endoscope system and a method of controlling the endoscope system and, in particular, an endoscope system including an endoscope insertion part to be inserted into a body cavity via a trocar stubbed in a body wall and a method of controlling the endoscope system.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally in a laparoscopic surgery, a trocar (an insertion instrument) is stubbed from the abdominal surface of an examinee into a body cavity, and then an insertion part of the laparoscope is inserted into the body cavity by using this trocar as a guide, thereby examining the presence or absence of an adhesion in the cavity or performing various treatments such as an adhesion treatment while observing a monitor display of a subject to be observed, such as an ovarian tumor or hysteromyoma. This laparoscopic surgery has advantages of being less invasive to a patient, compared with a laparotomy involving a large incision through an abdominal wall, and being able to create an expectation of early recovery.
An illumination window and an observation window are provided at the tip of an endoscope insertion part. With the inside of the body illuminated from the illumination window, the inside of the body cavity is observed via the observation window. Therefore, the observation window is required to be always in a clean state. However, smudges such as body fluids are attached to the surface of the observation window during an endoscopic examination. As a mechanism for cleaning the observation window of the endoscope insertion part, an injection nozzle may be provided. In this cleaning mechanism, a cleaning solution is injected from the injection nozzle to wash the smudges away from the surface of the observation window, and a compressed air is injected from the injection nozzle to blow drops of the remaining cleaning solution away from the surface of the observation window.
Meanwhile, in a laparoscopic surgery, there may be the case in which the smudges attached to the observation window cannot be sufficiently removed even when the observation window cleaning mechanism described above is used, resulting in a situation in which the field of surgical view is obstructed. In this case, for example, at the time of occurrence of view obstruction due to smudges of the observation window, the person performing surgery extracts the endoscope insertion part from the trocar and wipes the smudges off the observation window.
However, when the endoscope insertion part is extracted, the smudges such as blood and body fluids may be transferred into the trocar, and the smudges may be disadvantageously attached again to the observation window when the endoscope insertion part, having the smudges removed with an extra effort, is inserted into the body cavity via the trocar.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2009-273883 describes a technology of preventing a fluid in a trocar from depositing on a surgical instrument (for example, a laparoscope) inserted into the trocar. In this technology, a sensor for detecting the presence of a fluid or an instrument inside the trocar is provided. By vibrating the trocar according to an output from the sensor, the fluid in the trocar is prevented from depositing on the surgical instrument inserted into the trocar.